Thanks to my little brothers, I am constantly reminded how uncool reading is to today's adolescents. All throughout my adolescence and even up until now with this critical retrospect in the class, I have always taken my own love of literacy for granted. Even though i too grew up immersed in computer literacy and learning how to adapt with rapid advancements in technology, reading was always an essential part of my life both in and out of school. However today's preteen and teenager have a lot more entertainment at their fingertips constantly competing for their attention (and inevitably pulling them away from nurturing their own literature literacy development outside of the classroom setting). Most if not all of the teens i saw in the library during my stint as an assistant librarian were only there to check their myspace and surf around free game sites online.
However even though I do believe literacy for today's generation has certainly shifted away from a more traditional concept of reading (i.e checking out fiction books for fun) to a more technologically savvy definition literacy, i do not believe that literacy is lost on today's teens. If anything, I saw my students in Early College gobble up enough textual information on wikipedia in under 5 minutes that would put many of the reading comprehension skills of my 50yearold+ librarian coworkers to shame. In this vein, I do agree with Donna Alvermann when she points out the need to teach today's youth 'to read with a critical eye towards how writers represent people and their ideas.'
Especially in my content area, political science, critical comprehension while reading constantly updating twitter feeds and blog posts (which are, like it or not, the future of journalism and how current events are shared and discussed) is absolutely essential. Being able to critically read and comprehend multiple meanings and biases in not only scholarly texts but also current news articles is certainly crucial to 'becoming' a political scientist and is definitely a literacy skill i want to implement in my classroom.
Christin, I enjoyed your blog post. I myself have never had an extreme interest in reading. However, as I get older I have become interested in reading the newspaper, Newsweek, and other quick read postings. I can relate to your blog because, like your students, I am not much of a novel reader. Even though I am not the most tech savvy person, I do enjoy quick information such as through the ticker on the news or ESPN. As well, my own struggles with technology do not force me to dislike the advancement. Like you, I will also encourage my students to use their technology mindsets to their advantage. Maybe they will teach me a thing or two...
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